Probably the most extensive collection of salmon fly-hooks ever made was that which belonged to the late Mr. Henry Grant of Elchies, a property on which is some of the best water in all the run of Spey. His father was a distinguished Indian civil servant and of later fame as an astronomer; and his elder brother, Mr. Grant of Carron, was one of the best fishermen that ever played a big fish in the pool of Dellagyl. Henry Grant himself had been a keen fisherman in his youth, and when, after a chequered and roving life in South Africa and elsewhere, he came into the estate, he set himself to build up a representative collection of salmon flies for all waters and all seasons. His father had brought home a large and curious assortment of feathers from the Himalayas; Mr. Grant sent far and wide for further supplies of suitable and distinctive material, and then he devoted himself to the task of dressing hundred after hundred of fly-hooks of every known pattern and of every size, from the great three-inch hook for heavy spring water to the dainty little "finnock" hook scarcely larger than a trout fly. A suitable receptacle was constructed for this collection from the timber of the "Auld Gean Tree of Elchies"--the largest of its kind in all Scotland--whose trunk had a diameter of nearly four feet and whose branches had a spread of over twenty yards. The "Auld Gean Tree" fell into its dotage and was cut down to the strains of a "lament," with which the wail and skirl of the bagpipes drowned the noise of the woodmen's axes. Out of the wood of the "Auld Gean Tree" a local artificer constructed a handsome cabinet with many drawers, in which were stored the Elchies collection of fly-hooks classified carefully according to their sizes and kinds. The cabinet stood--and, I suppose, still stands--in the Elchies billiard-room; but I fear the collection is sadly diminished, for Henry Grant was the freest-handed of men and towards the end of his life anybody who chose was welcome to help himself from the contents of the drawers. Yet no doubt some relics of this fine collection must still remain; and I hope for his own sake that Mr. Justice A.L. Smith the present tenant of Elchies, is free of poor Henry's cabinet.